Somebody Else's Spring Break

When the Rolfe's came to see Cora in her play, that was part of their Spring Break, so we tried to show them a good time while they were here. Yes, you can actually be shown a good time in Omaha. You can come and visit us any time and test that out. Anyway we love the Rolfes,and the more we see them, the better!

Star of the Show

Cora has continued to be involved in the drama department here at the high school. Mostly she's been doing behind the scenes stuff, and has really come to enjoy that part of it. She directed Clue and was the stage manager for White Christmas. She designed the set for Clue, and helped build both the sets. She finally decided to try to get back on the stage and tried out for Habitation of Dragons - and she got the LEAD female role!!!

Wow, I was so dang proud of her. She did such an amazing job. She had everyone in the audience crying. It wasn't your typical high school play.

 It was a lot of hard work, and she had a lot of fun.

 In between scenes she had to get her makeup redone because her crying (which was real - yes, she taught herself how to cry on demand) would make her makeup run.

We had a lot of people from all over come out and support her, including Joe's parents from Utah, who had never had the opportunity to see her perform before.

And a few friends from Germany came too. It was fantastic!

Right after this she directed Once Upon This Island, and then directed a one act for a directing class she's in. It's been a busy year! I don't know if she'll ever be in a play again, or behind the scenes for that matter, but it has been a great learning experience for her to be a part of the drama department, in both high schools she attended, and she loved it.

Rain, Rain, Go Away

Remember the record amount of snow I posted about earlier? Well, right when we left for Spring break, the weather took a drastic turn for the warmer (which melted all the snow) and the wetter (massive rain storms), and then (sing it with me) "the rains came down and the floods came up." The saturated ground just couldn't handle it. The day after we left, all-time record flooding on several rivers caused multiple levees to overflow and/or fail. Bridges collapsed, streets were washed away, towns were evacuated, homes were lost, and even a wastewater treatment plant was flooded, so raw sewage was dumping into creeks and rivers, and then up onto people's land. It was crazy.

Our base is in a low-lying area where the Platte River meets the Missouri River - not the best place when it's flooding. About 1/3 of the base ended up flooding. In the picture below you can see the building that Joe worked in - the one that is circled, and only the roof is visible. They had been renovating it.

Here is a satellite view from before and after.

Anyway, coming home from Spring Break, we were worried that me might not be able to get home at all. This next picture shows the highway we normally would have taken home, but it was completely covered (the road going under the bridge....which looks like a river)

 And this map shows all the other road closures. We live right in the middle of this map.

We were also worried about flooding in our home. But we were very LUCKY! Again. Our town is situated on high ground, and not too close to any of the rivers, so we didn't have any flooding. And we were able to find an alternate route home that only added about 1 1/2 hours to our drive.

Others were not so lucky. Three people died in the flooding, and damages were estimated to be over 1 billion dollars. Recovery efforts are still underway, and prayers and donations are appreciated :)

And Then We Were Warm

Spring Break couldn't come soon enough this year! We decided to go to Universal Studios Orlando, but I don't know if we were more excited to go to Universal, or just to be warm. We ended up having the most perfect weather there, and we would have stayed forever if we could have.

We camped while we were in Florida, and the first night we got there, as we were setting up the tent trailer, our neighbors came over and gave us a plate full of homemade tortillas and BBQ. Oh my goodness, it was good.

Our first day at Universal we spent most of the time doing all things Harry Potter. It was cool, and I was fan-girling, I'm not going to lie. It is a very immersive experience, and if you're a big Harry Potter fan, I'd highly recommend it.

London from across the water

  Kreacher, peaking out the window at 12 Grimmauld Place.

 Entrance to Diagon Alley

 Wands from Olivander's

Casting Spells

   Frozen Butterbeer from The Hopping Pot

 The wrong side of the track

 The Knight Bus  

  King's Cross Station 

 Hogwarts Express

  Hogsmeade

 The Three Broomsticks

  The Family Feast was delicious!

  Hogwarts Castle

 

 

 With what little of the day there was left, we went on the Jurassic Park ride, which is still my favorite ride, and I think that was pretty much it.

 

The second day we took a break from Harry Potter to explore other magical lands....like Springfield.

 We enjoyed the giant pink doughnuts (we shared) as well as the Clogger from Krusty Burger, and the chicken and waffle sandwich from Cletus' Chicken Shack. We're all about the food.

We found ways to amuse ourselves while waiting in long lines. 

 Took a stroll down memory lane - I remember watching Johnny Carson a lot with my grandma.

  Hung out in Bikini Bottom.

 Wondered why The Fast and the Furious is still a thing.

And enjoyed the old school anamatronics of E.T.

The third day we were kind of all over the place. We spent a little more time in the Harry Potter world. 

We had an amazing meal at The Leaky Cauldron

 Fish and Chips, Toad in a Hole, and Bangers and Mash

 

 Back to Platform 9 3/4

 And then we discovered this place

 I swear we instantly turned into little kids - it was so bright, and colorful, and FUN!

 

 We literally laughed until we cried trying to get this jump shot with Cora and Joseph. Seriously, I almost peed my pants. I'm pretty sure people thought we were crazy.

We had so much fun at the the Mardi Gras parade. Beautiful floats, great music, tons of beads. Yep, lots of fun.

 

 

 And we finished off the night with the light show at Hogwarts.

 As we were leaving the park that night we noticed this tree (on the way to the parking garage) completely covered with everyone's Mardi Gras beads. We kept ours though ;)

 Our last day there we kind of took it easy - only about 1/2 a day at the parks. We were exhausted, and we'd done everything we wanted to do. But we re-visited Jurassic Park and Hogwarts, and then we tried a couple of new things that we hadn't done yet....and we got VERY wet :) It was hilarious, but it's a good thing we didn't stay the whole day.

 

I will say this about Universal - It's not my favorite park. The large majority of their rides these days are 3D, and I can only handle so much of that before I get sick. I mean, they're really cool, but I probably closed my eyes for half the time on half the rides. I 

On our way home my feet were SO swollen - compare before and after. Ugh.

 I don't know how lucky it is to have car problems, but we actually had a few hiccups on the way to and from Spring break, and I felt pretty darn lucky. On the way to Florida we had a lug nut break off. We were lucky to catch it when we did (before our tire flew off our van, which it could have), but we were also extremely lucky because halfway to Florida are the Rolfe's, our friends from Germany.

We were already planning to spend the night in the town next to them, and meet up for swimming at our hotel, which we still did, but afterwards we ended up going to their house to fix our car. Then, on the way home, our brakes started misbehaving, and again, we were able to stop at their house (this time for several hours) and fix that. Bonus - we got to spend extra time with good friends, plus that gave me extra time out of the car that I could put my feet up and help the swelling go down some. LUCKY! I should go to Vegas. That was our Spring break, and it was fabulous.